Intellectual knowledge and internal acceptance

Intellectual knowledge does not influence the subconscious as much as I would like. I know that physical appearance is no criteria to judge a person by, yet I can't help judging myself. I tell myself not to, and it happens anyway. Not that I'm so concerned with my looks, I don't really care about my dead, yellowing front tooth or my receding hair. But there's something that does bother me, and if ignoring the topic would get me anywhere it bet it would've done it by now, so I need to try something new. I do not like being fat. I absolutely hate it.

I was a chubby kid. It didn't really bother me in elementary school, maybe a little bit in fifth grade, but not much. I lived my life reading books, watching star trek, and playing with friends. Self image was not important. I barely remember thinking about it. Middle school was the different, and it was not an improvement. Somewhere in those three years I was made to know that I was fat, and, because of that condition, I was more or less inferior to my peers. This grew on me gradually, kids picked on me, but I didn't realize until much later what was going on. There was one particular incident, though, which stands out in my memory. I was in class (Geography with Mrs. Hull) and talking with a couple guys, surreptitiously during lecture, when I encountered an unflattering drawing of myself complete with man boobs (as pointed out by a label). This cut deep, because the guy who drew it, and the other fellow to a lesser extent, had been my good friend in elementary school and I had still considered him one. I don't remember exactly how I felt, but I felt bad. Bad enough to remember my mental screenshot of the picture as I write, ten years later.

I was desperately unhappy about the situation, but I didn't know how to handle it. I had never been active, had no interest in sports, and I felt prohibited from joining anything of the sort for fear of ridicule, which I had received enough of in gym classes. Thus I continued on: chubby, unhappy, and a total nerd. In retrospect it was probably my personality that drew attacks just as much as my weight, but that never occurred to me. In my mind I grew to demonize the traits of athleticism: equating fitness with vanity, stupidity, and cruelty. It wasn't the most enlightened perspective, but it was my defense mechanism (and I knew there were exceptions). Simultaneously, I was a very diligent student, since academic achievement was basically my sole source of praise and self respect.

In high school it was the same. At least for the first two, maybe two and a half, years. I was an unfit nerd with few social connections, by this point conditioned not to approach anyone, and not likely to be the receiver of much interaction. At some point in there I decided to do something about my condition and lose weight. I accomplished this solely through caloric deprivation. I didn't realize it at the time, but looking back I was probably bordering on an eating disorder. It did the trick though, and I became skinny. As a result people were basically more interested in what I had to say and, in senior year, my former image was replaced with the new Taylor: a thin pessimist with piercing and bitter insight, not to mention tongue.

People loved new Taylor and I had a great year, but, as I'm beginning to understand fully now, the damage was not repaired. I still have a tendency not to invite anyone to anything, because deep down I don't think they'll accept. I'm hesitant to share my feelings with others, because I know most people love little more than to mock. And, I have an unhealthy aversion to fat on my body. My last few months have been relatively sedentary, and it's the holiday season. I've been gaining some weight. And even though I know, on an intellectual level, that it's not really a big deal, other people don't care nearly as much as I do, if they even notice, that I will easily lose it in a month when I go to China, and it has no impact on my worth, it still drives me crazy. It would make sense if I felt disappointment, regret, or annoyance when confronting my returning jiggles, but what I actually feel, now that I think about it, is fear.

Somewhere inside that murky subconscious I must have an ingrained correlation between fat and alienation. As if gaining a few pounds will cause people to shun me. Now, to an extent this is actually true, but not anywhere near to the point I feel it. My question is now, "how do I change myself?" How can I straighten this kink and put image where it belongs, in the irrelevant category? I already "know" that it doesn't matter, but that hasn't changed the way I feel.

Oh well, this has basically been a rant, although I guess it's not angry, but you know what I mean. Well, as usual, the only "you" is me, Taylor, so of course you know. And although the subject today has been rather dark, it's not all bad things lying ahead. I have a much better understanding of what's going on these days, and, despite my tone earlier, I think my self possession is strong enough now to break down the misunderstandings and put things right.

Home

I'm living in the same old house, still living with my parents and my brother, but it doesn't feel like home when the other people want you gone. You know the feeling of standing in a place just as you're about to move out: at once so familiar, and yet empty of all it held before. This is the feeling I have now, not just in this house, but in my own mind.

It's taken me longer than most to reach this mark in life. I don't want to ask for things. My family is a mental burden. I don't enjoy being a disappointment, but it's not going to stop anytime soon, so I must leave. I'm sure they still love me, though I know I don't really understand the relationship between parents and children, but living with them is fettering.

It's mostly my Mom. Maybe she doesn't realize it, but she almost never speaks to me without mentioning something I should be doing, something I should have done, or something I did wrong. What I thought was a nice sunday morning, today, turned into a bothersome one when she began quizzing me on the jobs I've failed to secure. Why? I don't know. Did she think that anything good would come of it? Every day she asks me what I did and the answer is always the same, and she always knows it before she asks. "Not much," I say. I can only interpret her inquiries as criticism.

Perhaps I'm over-thinking, maybe. That is a habit of mine. But in any case it seems my days of unconditional acceptance at home are over. And it's not just you, even to me it feels like a case of dragging feet. If I had a job and lived in my own place none of this would be an issue. At the same time, though, I can't help but ask myself, "why? why did this all happen?" again, and again, and again. Life is an imposition, but I suppose I should concentrate less on how I got into this situation, and more on how I'm going to get out of it.

Well, I know how I'm getting out of it. I'm going to China. That's a about a month and a half away, with Christmas in between. I hope we can have some good times together before I go, because I won't be back for a long time. In the back of my head I feel I may never come back, maybe for a visit, but not truly. There's something appealing about life in a land where nobody knows you.

Note to Self

things that I'm making for thanksgiving:

eggnog, flan, black-bottom pie, bread. That should be good, need some way to use up all that whip cream, lol.

The Call of World Gone By

Today, for the first time in a long time, I caught a glimpse of Azeroth, World of Warcraft, and I was heartsick. I doubt you are able to understand, but I'm writing for myself, not for you.

To me, Warcraft meant community more than anything else. It was undeniably a game, and I enjoyed that aspect of it. However, not a single game exists which doesn't depend on the players to make it worthwhile. It's never the rules you follow which make a game. it's the people you strive against and the people you work alongside. To me, a person with very few friends, none of whom I could truly relate, Azeroth was a place to belong.

I guess it comes down to this: I felt needed. In Azeroth people depended on me and I delivered. One night, our guild wiped in molten core. It was a total wipe with no soulstones (translation: we'd played towards a goal for hours only to lose all hope of achieving it). I was the only member left alive, and as luck would have it I was carrying a rather uncommon item, albeit with a low success rate, that held the potential to reverse the situation. And it did. They were all so surprised when, as everyone pissed and moaned, we all started coming back to life. It may sound sad to you, but to me the gratitude and elation of those 39 gamers was the best thing I'd ever felt.

Anonymous people, some would say counter-intuitively, can be more sincere than close friends. Talking with my allies about their real life issues paved to way to some of the more adult relationships I've experienced, and that remains true today. We weren't afraid of one another, and that meant everything. I felt safe in imagination land: clever, strong, respected, and in good company.

But, while I loved my time there, it undeniably weakened my ties to the "real" world. Outsiders call Warcraft pointless. "The game never ends!," they'd say, "all you do is chase the best gear, compete with the other players, then, when you've got it all, new gear shows up and the whole thing starts over again, there's no point!"

And I wanted, so badly to scream back, "that's life! don't you see!? Should I work harder for material gear, to compete in the physical world? So I can be outdone here? Chase after the new stuff, again, here, with you? It's all pointless! Don't Fuck with me!" Yes, I was angry, and not just with them. I could feel my immersion slipping away, and I was afraid.

Ideal as it was Azeroth, the world without need, poverty, or true hate, has a glaring flaw, we can not actually live there. We hunger, we get cold, our goods can not be generated by code, and, so, we tear one another apart. Day by day, in one way or another.

I was right you know. "Real" life is just as pointless as Warcraft. They're pointless together, and what makes any of bearable are the people you're with, and how you play the game. Don't play to win, you can't win, it never ends. But, I could not return to Azeroth even if I tried. Azeroth is just the form of the apparition, the identity of the thing I miss so dearly is childhood.

Kung Fu

To me Kung Fu holds the promise of tangible knowledge: values and attitudes expressed in a nonverbal format. I can't trust words, I've given up on them. Words are the feeble, faustian diagrams we scribble to bind the changeling called truth. And when we turn our backs just for second to the noble prose,-- it morphs into a heap of toads. The truth is still the truth, make no mistake, just not what one thought it was, or, perhaps, what one wished so badly for it to be. After a lifetime of academia this is my conclusion: my academic learning was built upon striving, striving is based on accomplishment, accomplishment is born of desire, and desire is mother of suffering. In order to be happy one must align what one feels one should be doing with one is actually doing. If those two things are different, one can never, ever, be happy. One can pretend, but one cannot flee from one's one self.

Until that condition is met, the complete congruency of life and belief, any fleeting pleasure is just a topical treatment for underlying malaise. I can no longer see the value in structured academia. I never saw any to begin with, come to think of it, I just heard about and didn't bother to check my facts. Frankly, the years of failing to question the assumption that being a scholar was above all else led me to an inactive and lonesome life without meaning. My life to date, has borne a few good results: it has allowed me to craft my theories on existence, but now those theories condemn the very practices which bore them, and it is time for something else. It's time for Kung Fu!

I'm drawn to Kung Fu because, like dance, or song, no matter how useless or impractical it might seem in today's world, it's something I can internalize: Kung Fu doesn't rely on an outside source or context to be valid, it simply is what it is, it's physical, it's real. And I need some reality, something to ground me and save me, from nomadic philosophizing. I will say, not for the first time in history, that the principles of strategy remain the same across all scales. The sound strategies of Kung Fu all have corresponding actions in other areas of life. To find the right way of life once has only to translate those time worn movements into their underlying principles. Admittedly, this is not so easy, but at least it's a project.

Plus, I like to kick things.

(note, this post does need some revising. Due to languages standard and expected failure to express solely an authors intent, while eliminating other possible interpretations, as well as to my own haste this bit of writing is attributing attitudes to me that I don't, in reality, have. I will be back to fix it, but I really doubt that matters since nobody comes here in the first place)

Quixotic Logic

Intelligence, honesty, and knowledge were metrics I once used for worth. I lived in pursuit of the truth and the true path. Evil, illusion, deception, and insincerity were my enemies. I made many more by association. I would not suffer fools and carried the sword of truth, always, at my side.

Perception was all important to my young self. Deduction, inference, and extrapolation especially so. Each day I constantly practiced these skills on everything I saw. My wit grew sharper, my eyes practically all seeing. It got so I could hardly look at a person before I would tear them apart, uncovering their motives, their past, their qualities and reasons for those qualities. But by and by I took that that sword, and as I held it, examined it, suspicion stole over me: the shadow of fearsome deja vu, which, like a forgotten dream, eluded substance. And though a whisper warned me, "No, better not, that's such a good place to go," I had to know. I took that blade of insight, which I had mercilessly sharpened on others, and I stabbed myself. And out from the gash spilled a river of pent up truths.

I understood. I understood that, no matter how resolutely I opposed Evil, it was useless, because Evil does not exist, because Good does not exist. I understood that all my life I had operated on baseless assumption. It dawned on me that the hoard of information I'd accumulated, opinions fought for, correct spellings defended, were make believe. I watched my cherished insight descend into limitless Ouroborosian conclusions, and destroy itself. Desperately I chased the waterfall of cause and effect back into infinity and realized what I should have known all along: that all knowledge is but illusion, that I don't actually know anything.

And I still don't, and I never will, not in that objective way I once sought. Logic is useful, ultimately, only for discovering this one irrefutable fact: that all we know is a loose array of undefined terms, and that from time time we forget. That Quixotic sword of logic still hangs at my side, but I don't touch it much. Often I'm tempted out of anger or hope, to tear it free and cut down the others around me, even though they know not what they do, to blight them with my insight and shatter their illusions. But what would that accomplish? If I succeed I'll simply create unhappiness. Misery does love company, but I'd rather not come by it that way.

Besides, the truth, one of them anyway, is that a until a man derives meaning for himself he never believes. He simply assumes, "ah, of course, they've got it completely wrong," and goes on with life. Only when an argument comes from within is it futile to resist.

First There is a Mountain

Research that is done to support a theory cannot be trusted. What is respected are theories drawn from impartial research. I mention this because I have arrived at a conclusion which I never expected to reach, nor would have labored to support had I been conscious of the theory which is this: there are no causes, no effects, and reality unfolds as one event in accordance with what I can only call fate.

Strictly speaking, cause and effect do exist, but not as functional laws. This is because what appears to be one event is actually an incomprehensible number, and the cause for any "one" event is not one cause, but an infinitely large number of them. It troubled me for a long time that the root of causation is unknowable and that, therefore, all knowledge is illusory. I considered cause and effect viable but incomprehensible. I now I see they only exist as tautologies: stuff happens because it happens, undeniable, but also quite useless. Well, not at all useless, but useless for explaining things. This idea is only good for understanding.

So: fate. I do not mean fate in a way that concerns prophecy or predestination. With any set of objects in motion their movements, from beginning to end, no matter how difficult they are to calculate, are set. Cause and effect only appear to exist based on our incomplete sampling of space and time. In other words, there are no coincidences there is only inevitability. As the Hindu reads, "He sees, who sees that all actions are performed by nature alone, and that the Self is action less."

Overflow

Daily writing has become an unreasonable idea. Today was my second day at a new job, an exciting job, which is good, but for that it drains my energy completely. Till Sunday I was largely relaxing with my friends, exercising, and cooking. None of these things are bad, but it has been a full week since my last entry.

Like I say, though, everything in life is a choice. It's never the case that people "don't have time." However, it's always the case that they chose to use their time for something else. Despite whatever virtue one attaches to that "else," things are still a choice.

Imperialism in the World of Ideas

In argument, people are very childish. Unable to accept the consequences of admitting fallibility they will argue on behalf of falsehood rather than confront the truth. If certain truths are an obstacle to their victory, they are mostly left unmentioned. This is a mistake. It is not most important to be right individually, what's important is arriving at the truth of the situation. By ignoring information to preserve intellectual "victory," the virtue of communication, and even thought, is destroyed. It is cheating. If one cheats on a test, receiving a high mark instead of a low one, it does not mean that one is intelligent. It's like renting a house, inviting your relatives over, and pretending that you own it. Winning an argument by deceit it is no victory at all: If anything, it is a betrayal of oneself.

Having established that thought, I'll move a little closer to my main topic: ownership. Ownership of what? Ownership of things.

How is ownership established? Who forges the little chain between someone and something, and says "there, that's yours"? It's a mystery, isn't it? All things that are owned by somebody were, at one point or in some form, things that belonged to nobody. What changed? If I pocket a beach pebble, what makes it mine? I say, nothing. The only thing connecting possessions and the people who "possess" them, is that the possessors want to possess the possessions. But wanting something to be true does not make it so. Just as it's detrimental to believe oneself proficient at roulette (when that is clearly impossible), it is also harmful to deceive oneself in other ways. You will, so to speak, lose your fortune. If you disagree, ask yourself: have I any proof to the contrary? Or is the idea too threatening to my lifestyle, to my concept of the world, for me to seriously consider?

It may be easier to think on this issue of "ownership" by narrowing the scope to simply "land ownership". Because all physical possessions are derived from the land, if we can resolve the issue of ownership with respect to the Earth itself the entire issue will be solved. Before we decide if Bill stole Bob's gold, we must establish that Bob owned the gold to begin with. And where did he get it? He took it from the Earth.

Who owns the Earth? Certainly there are many nations, and they seem to own the Earth. But, do they? No. They want to. They have the globe all parcelled up. Strong countries are even capable of things like borders, states, and fighting off those who would encroach on their "territory." But does that make the land theirs? No. If I steal a cupcake from a toddler, is that mine? Well, in a sense it is, I can do whatever I want with it. But that is only because of my brute strength, that is not because I own it.

The explorers of history were megalomaniacs. Who looks out on a new land and thinks, "well, I guess this is mine now, I saw it first. I want it."? How absurd. Every new place we go, every old place for that matter, has existed for an age, and will remain for ages to come. What flimsy logic can make the land ours? Why doesn't it belong to the dandelions or the toads? Were I to stumble on the proverbial pie on the windowsill, I wouldn't think it was mine. What else is the globe besides such a pie?

As usual I have become very sidetracked. Fear not though, this last paragraph contains the original motive behind all this exposition. What I started out to say, is that ideas are no different than places. Coming up with an idea and claiming it for one's own is just as silly as discovering a wonderful new continent and, deciding that because it's new to you it must be new to everybody, claiming it for yourself. In reality, the world exists together with mankind, but there is no reason to think it belongs to us. When we think up a new idea, we are not creating that idea, we are simply seeing it for the first time. Just because it is out of sight does not mean that something does not exist. All places in the universe exist. If one had the time and means, they could all be visited. It is the same for the world of ideas. They all exist, but many have not been visited.

The Cloud-capp'd Tow'rs

What follows is only a skeleton for my eventual composition.

The old are dull, and grey and, routine. The falsely accused inmate, Imagination, languishes in the adult mind. She was a twinkle-eyed young thing. Now she slouches, despondent, in that cold cell. On the stone walls houses with dandelions out front and flying snakes and caped magicians are overwritten in tallies. Not your standard affair these figures grow in rows of six, with a vicious line down the middle. Day by day the towers rise like a terrible pyramid. You can read them in her eyes: "To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow," they seem to say, "Creeps in this petty pace from day to day, To the last syllable of recorded time."

It happened again, as I was laying out my ideas I got sucked into a small piece of my own metaphor, and lost the way back out. I had meant to write a short piece about the impermanence, not to mention insignificance, of what our age deems "truths of reality." I meant to draw a likeness between the illusions cloud watching children enjoy and the realities of the world. You see, the process is the same. "The way things are," in the warped perception of most people, is based on a foundation just as illusory as any cloud vision. Existence is our cloud, we make of it what we may, but it is not a monkey, a rabbit, good, or evil.

Adults are not actually weak in imagination. If anything it is too powerful in them. The manage to imagine that they understand. Very few, in our age, or any other, have been able to differentiate their own fanciful interpretations from true reality. Why? That is something for another day. The thoughts that run so clear in my head scatter when the net approaches.

My topic for tomorrow: travel in the world of ideas, a new perspective on ownership.

And for a later day: ants in the thorns.

And for a later day: language, a demon in the diagram.

I've done it again

It's the end of the day, again, and I've neglected my daily writing. I won't last long at this rate.

It's late and I'm very tired. But, I will make an effort to write something-- never mind the quality. I think of this exercise as an earring. After you get your ears pierced you have to keep something in the hole for a couple days to keep it from closing up. That's what this is, just a smattering of words to entrench the new habit.

I had some very good ideas today, but hours (perhaps days) are in order to do them justice. I can't even think about beginning that task now. I will say that, today, I finally discovered the words to describe the mental process I've been exploring for the past two years now. This is terribly exciting news, if you're me.

Riding back in the skiff with Mom, Dad, and Emily I admired my good fortune. Sometimes, for a few moments, existence can be a beautiful thing.

Stream of Conciousness

My mind is a place both shallow and deep. Ideas, shoals of flashing thought, dart about devouring one another. There are all different kinds. Monstrous squid wander the depths and, here and there, sleek Mako cruise the expanse. I have my tropics too, blooming with color, and a few clown-fish to brighten the scene. Like all wild things, they are shy.

These thoughts belong in the wild, they fare poorly in captivity. Most times, no sooner have I set down the pen than I glance back at the poor creatures and feel a little sick. There they are, futilely bumping away against the glass. My present catch thrashes apprehensively in the tank: still brimming with vitality. That will soon change.

Where was I going with this? It started off as a short post about my difficulty with committing my ideas to paper. I have no trouble thinking them up, but I know I can't transcribe them faithfully from brain to paper without somehow losing the important bits. As I was about to type that I struck, somehow, upon the idea of ideas as living things, and from there I jumped easily to the ocean metaphor.

It is difficulty to describe the difference between life and death. What makes a person live. What spark of animation fades upon death? Although we do not know, the discrepancy is glaring to our human eyes. In my metaphor, which I abandoned out of impatience, a similar difference exists between ideas in my head and ideas on the page.

A Questionable Venture

Now that the time comes for my first entry, I find myself befuddled. What am I supposed to write? My dreams of a well-wrought body of writing, worthy of existence and sharing with others, seem unfounded. But lets have less thinking and more doing. I'll begin at the beginning: an explanation for my presence in our modern sphere of sound and fury.

There was a time when I fancied myself a potential writer. I was, from a young age, a fantasy bibliophile, confident in my ability to dream a story with the best. I imagined, with happiness, creating new literature for the world-- writing destined to supersede the shallow fantasy I saw around me. That was a different time.

I will not detail the changing of my mind. I barely understand the change myself. But heroic deeds and magic for magic's sake no longer interest me as they once did. Some of that interest remains, but now I recognize fantasy for its true purpose, a purpose my younger self was not aware of. He was a clever person, but could not see the forest for the trees.

So, now, although I have lost my once clear goal (I'm no longer sure if I even want to write fantasy), I will write: nothing too ambitious, just a bit day by day to sharpen my prose, punctuation, and style. I doubt many visitors will chance on this internet backwater, but, should they do so, I hope the read will be of some value.